Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko said he has signed a notice of suspicion for the director of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau, Semen Kryvonos. He claims that during searches at the Prosecutor General’s Office, representatives of NABU and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office gained access to protected case materials relating to their managers and colleagues.
The Prosecutor General’s Office is providing procedural oversight in dozens of criminal proceedings investigating “serious and especially serious” crimes allegedly committed by employees of the anti-corruption agencies, Ruslan Kravchenko said.
“I have signed a notice of suspicion for NABU Director Semen Kryvonos. I suspect him of forging official documents to obtain an unlawful benefit on an especially large scale, and of a fictitious adoption in order to artificially create grounds to avoid liability in court,” said the Prosecutor General, who has submitted his resignation.
The second notice of suspicion concerns “a person close to the head of the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office” for allegedly influencing judges of the High Anti-Corruption Court and evading mobilisation.
Kravchenko said he had previously been deterred from signing the notices of suspicion by the President and the anti-corruption agencies, who, he claims, were “offering guarantees of immunity in exchange for refusing to issue notices of suspicion”.
As for the substance of the case in which the head of a department at the Prosecutor General’s Office is suspected of covering up illegal call centres — a person with whom Kravchenko himself, according to investigators, communicated — he said nothing.
- NABU and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office have repeatedly reported pressure being exerted on them amid investigations into corruption at the highest levels of state power.
The “Carthage” Investigation
On 4 September, NABU and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office announced that they were conducting a special operation to expose a criminal organisation led by an official of the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine. According to NABU and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, members of the organisation created in 2025 may be involved in providing “protection” to a network of fraudulent call centres and in laundering assets.
Five people are under suspicion. The charges are Article 255 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (establishing and leading a criminal organisation, as well as participation in it) and Article 209 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (legalisation (laundering) of property). In the suspects’ conversations, a “Boss” is also mentioned — a person who directed Kropyva. No notice of suspicion has been issued to this person so far.
Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko says he is not involved in the case.
At a closed meeting with journalists, he said he would not resign. However, after meeting the President later that evening, he submitted a resignation letter. The Verkhovna Rada still has to vote on it.
Kravchenko’s first deputy has also submitted a resignation letter.